Not A Stamp Collector - Inherited 75 Old Stamps - Help!

I got 75 stamps from a box my grandfather had saved when he was younger. I am 49 if this gives you an idea of the age of the stamps. I scanned them and was hoping someone can tell me if these are of interest to collectors and possible value of them?

I will post a few pics to start with and get some ideas:












I have a bunch of other presidents also.


also have similar ones in 1 and 2 cents due.

This is a random sampling - a lot more.

Welcome to SCF, Earl!

As with most collectables, condition is everything. The stamps you have posted pix of here are all pretty rough and would fall into the category of "fillers" (a term that describes damaged stamps that fill a hole in your collection until you find a better one).

After a cursory glance of your stamps, I see nothing of great value, but they may be of interest to you nonetheless.

The last stamp is a 10c postage due that was in use from 1894 until around 1930. If in good condition it would have a catalogue value ranging from .50 to $30 depending on perf type, watermarks, and color. None of those can be definitively identified with a scanned image.

The other stamps are fairly common stamps from the 1920s & 30s, and have minimal value even if in good condition.

If you are genuinely interested in learning more, I recommend visiting your local public library and ask for a Scott Specialized catalogue of US stamps. If they do not have the Specialized catalogue, Volume 1 of the Scott standard catalogues covers US stamps (in less detail).

Good luck, and enjoy your inherited hobby!

Brian

These would have family significance, which is neat, but that will be about it. Condition is vitally important, and many of these seem to have some issues, ranging from minor to fatal.

(Even if they were in nice condition, they are common stamps.)

hello Earle43, welcome!

Quick answer, well, most of the ones shown so far are damaged, that is, they have nicks or tears or pieces missing, etc, that devalue any stamp (or anything else for that matter).

Second thing is that they all seem common type of stamps, so even if old, millions were printed *people mailed a lot of letters back then) and so are plentiful and cheap.

The yellowish 10c US stamp with the barred cancel is known ass a precancel and it may (not sure myself) have a mistake or error in the Pittsburgh spelling , extra letter or something at the end?) and so may be worth more to a collector of those type of stamps?

The 14c blue Indian is a stamp a lot of people like (me included) but with a corner missing it is not too pretty to a collector, crazy as we all are at times.

Don't give up yet though, keep posting pics. You may have one with an printing error or a rare one. Who knows?

Most common stamps are worth a few cents. Damaged ones are usually garbage (but check for special errors or cancels or postmarks). Always good to check.

We all like to see stamps and you are doing a bang up job at getting good scans of the stamps so keep going I say.

Ah, the postage due stamp. Perfs and watermark, ay?

Perfs are perforations, the holes around the edge of the stamp and how many there are within 2 centimeters (metric). You can find a perf gauge that you can print out on the web but best to get a metric ruler and do som math.

Watermarks are designs pressed into the paper when it was made. Turn the stamp over, lay it on a black surface, maybe wet it with a bit of water (won't hurt it) and see if you see a design in the paper. Maybe hold the stamp up to a light also works sometimes.

There may be different designs possible as the stamp may have been printed different times on different papers so looking online or asking here or looking at the library in a Scott's stamp catalogue in the front pages will show you different watermark designs.

Welcome Earle. I'd have to echo the sentiments aired above. Like you I've go a similar batch inherited from my Dad, which he kept in a tin cigarette box (the box is probably worth more than the stamps).
'Dad's collection', as I now call it, is pretty worthless except to me, but it holds a place of honour with the rest of my stamps. The true value in them lies in happy memories and warm thoughts. And that's not cheap!

I appreciate the help and advice from everyone so far.



If I didn't have a friend from Pittsburg who constantly reminds me they dropped the "H" years ago, I would say the same thing. But everytime I see the modern spelling I still think it looks funny to me without the "H."

I can appreciate stamps b/c of the history/artwork but you can only become serious in so many things in your allotted number of years. I already have two time consuming hobbies. And one of these demands a lot of time since I am trying to get a reference book finished and out to the publisher!

My main goal in this is to find out if anything here is of value to someone who can appreciate them. I would hate to think I had something tucked away in a book that someone out there was dying to find. In my other hobbies I have had people help me out by locating items I specialize in and have come to think it almost a crime when a desired & historic item just ages in a closet where no one can see/appreciate it for what it is.

Anyway - OK - you asked for them - lets go with round 2:

Well - I have spent the last hour trying to get the online image optimizer to load my pictures. I even went into my graphics program and reduced them there by hand - all 75 of them! And when I try to load them, the forum software says they are too large (despite the fact they fall within the pixel allowances used by the picture optimizer on this forum)


So I tried loading the smaller pictures with the optimizer and it refuses to load them - the site just sits there and spins as if it is loading. Since I do this quite a bit on the CCF coin forum - I know it is not me at least - just the forum machine having a Microsoft Moment

I guess I will have to post them later and hope things will start working.

Thanks for all the help so far

The file size (not the properties size on disk) has to be below 100K each to load.

Could be an MM too though.

Thanks for the reminder. I knocked them all down to below 100K - still problems - so I think its Gate's Gotchaware. Will try later. Chomping at the bit to get them posted and learn though!

Preserverence!

I have been uploading pics OK today / tonight.

Are the file names without spaces? I use dashes - between all words or numbers myself.

YUP - just going to start trying again. I left one to try to load for 15 minutes and this is when I quit.

If the files are named as a JPG or a jpeg and not as a jpg they won't load either I just found out.

Oops - has a Skype call come in from my daughter! Hey thanks for that - I will have to check them...

Round 2 I hope...






Well - 2- of them went into the optimizer right away and the third one is stalled. They are pretty much all the same size and all extensions are identical.

I'll just keep trying!

3 more and now stalled again:


10.


I know the following 3 are the same - but since I know absolutely nothing - I will post all 3.

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20. I know its in too sad of a shape - but just curious if different colors of duplicates are significant